


Haunted Love

by Floris_Oren



Series: Creature Feature [2]
Category: White Collar
Genre: Art History!Neal, Character Death, El and Peter are Ghosts, F/M, Gallery Manager!Neal, Haunted Houses, Hopefully not cliche, June Owns the gallery, M/M, Mozz is a questionable person, Multi, Neal is not a Criminal, Paranormal Romance, The College AU no one asked for, but not bad, off screen character death
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-01-05
Updated: 2016-01-11
Packaged: 2018-05-12 00:57:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,083
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5648035
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Floris_Oren/pseuds/Floris_Oren
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Neal moves into a house because the rent is so low; things take an odd turn when he finds out what happened at the house and maybe the ghosts don't mind him too much either. They do, however, mind some people who come around.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This idea has been in my head since October. I wanted to write it for Halloween but knew I'd never be able to get it done. So. I decided that for my fist multi-chapter fic of the new year I'd give it a whirl. :) Please give me idea's of what the haunting can do. I don't want to be cliche but at the same time I do try my best to keep stuff as close to real life as possible. 
> 
> Enjoy.

  
"This place is Spooky." Mozzie said as he carries one of many wooden crates into Neal's new place. The two story sits on a slightly busy street in Manhattan. A very ritzy place, but for some reason the rent for this place was so low that Neal didn't even have to have a room mate or a second job. His full time at the Art Gallery he manages would cover it, the utilities and then some. If he hadn't gotten all the grants for college, that'd be one thing. At least he could live off campus.

Neal laughs. "Yeah." the place hadn't been cleaned in ages but no one has spray painted in it and the pipes hadn't broke during the winter so all it really needed was good spring cleaning. Neal was glad he could get in early because he needed at least two weeks to clean the place top to bottom before his classes started and he still had to work.

"Is that everything?" Mozzie asked. There are a total of twenty crates, a few suite covers that hung on the banister to go upstairs and a few cardboard boxes full of books and music and other little things to decorate the living room.

"I need some furniture." Neal muttered, his last place had been furnished for him so he couldn't take any of it.

"I'm on it..." mozzie got onto his phone and soon he'd ordered all the furniture Neal could need.

"How much....?"

"Paint me a copy of a Rembrandt or two and we'll call it even." Mozzie replied.

"Mozz...."

"What I do with it is my business, but make sure it's an exact copy." he winked. "The delivery will be done tomorrow." and then he slipped out. Done with the duty all best friends seemed to get stuck with; and scuttled on towards other tasks for the day.

Neal shook his head; He had no idea what his friend did with the paintings and he was slightly suspicious of it now. But, a deal is a deal and he can always deny that he knew what Mozz did with it. After all, some people REALLY liked their reproductions because they couldn't afford the real deal.

Neal decides to set up his art study first.

~*~

Neal whistles as he places his text books on the cheap book shelf he found in the attic. He'd been told that some people had left stuff that the owner just hadn't gotten around to getting rid of. So his office is a collection of these things that somehow became his. The book case is teal with scuff marks on it, making it look vintage. It's tall and his books take up a good section of it. He hangs some of the original painting's he's done. Early work that would look horrible to anyone else but that he likes enough to hang up, at least, privately.

The desk is well used, and will be fine to work at when it comes to his own art. His lap top sits on it and there's an elephant lamp sitting near the ledge, the husk is broken but it's varnished and looks bohemian. The rug is shag and an ugly orange collar but it'd do. His easel is already set up and there's a half baked concoction of impressionism on a canvas that he has no idea what to do with but it needs to be finished.

His paints sit on a bakers wrack along with the vases he uses for washing his brushes and plates for paint and what ever other art supplies he needs. The window to the office gets the best lighting which is why he chose this room.

A sudden BANG from down stairs startles Neal from his thoughts. The book on The Dutch Golden Age falls from his hands. He knew both the front and back doors had been locked. The BANG comes again, this time in a succession of three. Neal frowns, and goes down stairs to look.

The living room is as he left it. The kitchen on the other hand, all the cupboards had been closed last he looked, now they all hung open. And one is flapping open and shut on its own. Almost like someone is doing it to get his attention. It continues on and all Neal can do is watch. The room is very cold.

"Stop it." Neal said. The cupboard stills. He hummed. Not entirely certain what to do now. He'd never talk to....spirits or ghosts before. He certainly isn't psychic.

"Thank you." he says, then he turns and instead of going back up stairs he goes to the living room. He sets up his tv and puts his DVD's away. Nothing else happens. He looks at his watch, the library is closed but he knows someone who'll let him in late. Maybe a bit of research not geared towards Master Painter's is in order.

~*~

"Peter and Elizabeth Burke died on October the 31st after a House Invasion gone bad." Neal read to himself. The library is dark but the computer terminal is lighting up the small space with a light blue hugh and he's alone except for the night watchman who lets students in if they desperately need to do some last minute research for a project, for a fee of course.

"The FBI Agent died trying to save his wife, she was shot first. Agent Burke was shot not long after and died in the hospital. The suspects are still on the loose and are suspected in an ongoing FBI case that Agent Burke was investigating when he and his wife were horrifically murdered..." Neal shook his head. The journalist who wrote the article sounded as if she or he were straight out of school. It was too sensational and vague on details for his liking.

Neal went to the web instead. Searching old news paper out of print is one thing. But maybe the net would give him what he actually needed and he hadn't been able to get anything set up at his place yet. The Cable man not able to come out until after the weekend. And it was Saturday.

"KILLED BY THE PINK PANTHER'S...." the new article read. It was dated mid 2000's. So the Burkes had been dead for about four or so years. The new article said that Agent Peter Burke had been going after a gang of thief's who called themselves the Pink Panther's because they felt they were the best and taking them down would really be good for the FBI. They decided to kill his wife, and by all evidence, they waited for Agent Burke to get home and killed him in an ambush.

This article seemed far more likely than the previous one. Neal shook his head. He was living in a Murder House. The next article he clicked in pertained to the Burke's murder but in a different way.

The Paranormal Article entitled; "Vengeful Ghosts" tell of a tenant (at least three before Neal) who lived there for a month but was chased out by banging cupboards, shadow people, and a cry in the dark that spooked them so much. It apparently happened at three in the morning, on the dot. The expert of the article decided it was a residual haunting.

Neal may not be an expert in the paranormal, but he didn't think it was residual. He isn't a skeptic but Shadow People weren't anything to joke about. And after what happened that after noon, he's pretty sure it had to be an intelligent haunting.

Which is the next thing he google searches.

~*~

"Haunted." Mozz asked the next day as he helped Neal arrange his new furniture. The four poster bed had been set up by the delivery people, and the box springs and mattress placed on it. Neal is making the bed up with elegant dark blue sheets, and an elegant bedspread. He may be a college student but he doesn't decorate like one. Thank you very much. The furniture Mozz got is elegant like Neal like's. Though, he wont deny the charm of a small, Paris apartment with a single bed and a table.

"Yeah. I swear the cupboard was moving on its own." Neal replied.

"I know you wouldn't lie to me." Mozz replied. "What'd your research do for you?"

"Nothing much, I guess I should do a cleansing but the Burke's died horribly here they might never move on." Neal shrugged.

Mozz, being one of the odd types who investigated paranormal experiences nodded; "They could be violent." he said.

Neal went to open his mouth when a random stuffed toy from his ex, Kate, smashed Mozz in the face. The stuffed horse fell to the floor while Mozz screamed like a little girl.

"What the hell?" he demanded.

Neal grinned and snickered; "I guess they don't like being called violent. After all, Peter was an FBI Agent."

"So? there are Agent's who aren't very good people." Mozz replied.

"Yeah, but from all the articles I read, Peter was the best and he was good. So I doubt that either he or his wife will hurt me. Probably hate where I put the dishes, but that's something that can be changed anyway, so whatever." Neal finished making his bed. Picked the horse up and went to put it on a dresser.

"Why do you keep that thing anyway?" Mozz frowned. Kate had been a mistake. He never should have introduced the Con Woman to Neal.

"She never said good by, I'm not like her, but even a note would have been nice." Neal shrugs as if it still doesn't hurt and it'd been a year.

Neal glanced at the clock; "I have to change and be at work soon."

Mozz nodded. "I was on my way out anyway," and he escaped, ghost molested free.

Neal felt eyes on him as he picked out one of his nicer suits. June, the owner of the Gallery, liked her manager's to look nice. Neal wasn't able to afford the suite's she suggested to him, so she fixed the problem on her own with giving him some of her husbands stuff. Even a nice, fedora hat that looked good on him if he places it at a jaunty angle.

Neal always felt different when he dressed in these suites. He knew what he was doing when it came to the gallery, art being his prime talent and something he loved, but...maybe in another life....he'd be a major art thief. Possibly world famous, and he was lying to himself if he didn't say the idea appealed to him. But, it's an idea for a book. One he's started but hasn't looked at in weeks.

He turns to the room and goes for the master bath. The eyes are still on him and he doesn't know if it's supposed to make him feel weird or scared or what. But for some reason he's into the voyeurism.


	2. Ghostly back story

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Peter and Elizabeth are very hard to live with even if they are dead.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Was looking what I had for this chapter over and decided that it'd do as is. It may be a bit short but I tried to give their end of things. I'll probably switch between POV's like this.

They died on a crisp, clean, fall day. Halloween. The day is cursed. She hadn't really known she was dead, not until she saw them kill Peter too. Then he was there and they could touch each other but nothing else. And she was angry.

So angry in fact that she turned away from the light, Peter turned too because he wouldn't pass over, not without her, so they stayed. The light left, but it came at odd times until it stopped coming and she roamed the house from top to bottom day in and day out. Years went by in this timeless space. The afterlife didn't know time but the clocks kept running, and when they were broken someone came along to fix them.

Their home was cleaned, their stuff packed up by relatives and taken away. The house sat empty for a month or so before the first tenants moved in. They were okay. El didn't like where the wife put the olives, and they always switched the jar from one place to another until the wife left it be. Peter didn't like the husband at all. He made it so every time the man took a shower it was cold, and that he'd trip down the last stair. Not anything to kill him but they spooked the couple enough that they moved. Of course, the pot stash was probably what set Peter off when the husband brought home another woman when the wife was away. They got high and fucked in the marriage bed and that really wasn't nice. And El liked the wife, so, they could only hope she got caught up on the program after they left the haunted house.

The next renter was a portly old man, he's balding and fat. And not someone Peter would like, at all. It took them five minutes to know that this man would hurt the neighbor's six year old. They went all out ghost on him, and they left some incriminating evidence on the neighbor's front stoop. The cops were called and he was taken away. They passed into their neighbor's house to see what had happened some time later. That man wouldn't get out of jail any time soon.

The third instance was a lesbian couple. By now El and Peter were very wary of people who lived in their house. This couple were okay, but they started asking questions. Putting a tape recorder out for them to speak into. They demanded that she and Peter show that they were with them in the room. And then their friends started coming and using a board to try and communicate with them.

El cried. Peter flung the damned thing across the room. That scared everyone out. It wasn't huge, not like in the films. But it made the point and they all left. The Couple moved out soon after, apparently they weren't going to try and get a Paranormal reality tv show, and then...

Neal walked through that door. Neal with his dark hair and light eyes. With that smile, his art and El fell in love instantly. Peter hung back, just watching. But El put the olives where she liked them and Neal let her. They organized the kitchen one day. He whistled and said things to the air. She laughed and said something back but he couldn't hear her. They had to come up with a system.

"If it's okay with you, El..." because he'd gone to the Library to see what had happened and he figured she'd be in the kitchen with him. For whatever reasons.

"How about you bang on something, once for yes and twice for no, okay?" he said to the air.

She knocked on the wall, once.

He smiled.

"Okay, can I put the dishes in the third cabinet beside the sink?"

A single knock answered him. He began to take some china out of a box. El liked her mismatched dishes. None of them matched at all and everything looked like she was having a mad hatter tea party when set out. But those dishes are long gone so the elegant China Neal had gotten from some where go into that cabinet.

And by the end of the day they have it all set up like how she used to have it, there were small differences but not enough for her to go and bang a cupboard about it. Neal wondered into the living room. He got all "yes" knocks while setting it up. She really didn't care, they had to let him put his mark on the space as well.

Peter, looks at all the books the man put in the office upstairs and what he's putting down here, ever the FBI Agent. Nothing rises his hackles and he's already snooped to see if Neal was a drug addict. It really was only when his friend insinuated that they were violent ghosts and Peter threw the stuff toy at him. Neal didn't seem worried. And they continued on until it was time for their human to go to sleep.

"ours." El says to Peter as they kiss.

Peter has to agree.

But he can admit when he is wrong and even though it's only been like two days. He does like the kid.

~*~

Neal did not want to let Keller into the house. The man was a cheat and lying thief. Keller pushed his way in even though Neal said "no" mentioned plans. Keller just laughed at him. Got into the house and started messing everything up. Neal was angry but hid it as best he could.

"Oh com on, everyone knows you do their home work." Keller said.

"I do not do that any more. I was homeless, fuck off." Neal replied. He didn't curse often but when he did it was to get a point across. Keller whirled on him. Pushed Neal up against the wall, but then he was halfway across the room. Smashed into the wall.

~*~

Peter was on alert when the man pushed his way in; Neal did not seem to like it. Peter tried to let Neal handle it, to get the man out. But as soon as Neal was threatened. Both Peter and El slammed the man across the room. Neal looked surprised and the man high tailed it out of there.

They held onto each other and that's when Neal keeled over.

~*~

Thankfully he woke alone. So no one but the ghosts could tease him and while he had known they were there, he hadn't actually Seen-Seen them. Just felt them watch him when he was doing anything and everything.

In that moment, he saw Peter and El, bloodied and rotting.

He couldn't believe what he had seen, and he blacked out. Now, several moments later. The Faces looking at him are normal. El is dark and beautiful and Peter is blond and handsome. Neal feels hot all of a sudden. And the words float through his mind.

"Are you okay?" the voice sounded like a woman's in his head.

"Yes, El, I'm fine." Neal replied. Blinking up at them.

"How can you do that?" he asked. Because he didn't think they were old enough ghosts to be able to do this.

"This is our first try, we're surprised it's lasted this long." Peter said.

Neal sat up, realized he was in bed. "Weird."

"Are you going to run away?" El asked, slowly the two disappeared from sight.

Neal shook his head; "No."

He felt them hugging him. It was tingling and warm, they had been worried about him. They didn't like Keller coming in and harassing him. Neal smiled.

At least someone cared.


	3. A Psychic visit

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Neal and El have their first fight.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter sucks but here it is.

Neal wonders if things are getting out of hand one night when he and one of his ghostly protecters fight over the covers; about him sleeping under as opposed to him kicking them to his side. Every time Neal kicked the blankets away, they'd slither up his form and lie atop him. Again. Neal didn't know how long the battle lasted until both El and Peter got mad about it.

He growled, kicked the blankets onto a pile on the floor, told the two of them to leave him alone, and then fabric was flying up at his face and he found himself swathed in layers upon layers of fabric. He wasn't able to move around much and it was hard to breath, but he managed. And that's how he stayed till morning.

The shower was running, hot, when the blankets let him go and he scurried to the bathroom before anything else could attack him. He washed under the watchful eyes of his ghost care takers. He did so quickly. Usually it didn't bother him, he's tired and not in the mood to deal with it today.

When he gets out the words are written on the mirror where the steam had fogged it up; WE TAKE CARE OF WHAT IS OURS.

Neal cringed.

Maybe this wasn't such a good idea after all.

~*~

"They attacked you?" Mozz asked. He looked up from the book about Big Foot he had been reading. Neal is tired. He hadn't gotten any sleep the night before. He told Mozz all the sordid detail of the blanket battle and his ghosts being overly concerned.

"I think maybe I should have cleared them out when I had a chance." Neal said.

"Huh, well...I know a person...."

~*~

Charisma Crimson Song is exactly the sort of Psychic one would think; she's an older woman, a bit of a Hippie and talks in a whisper most of the time. She "senses" something about the house and tells Neal what he already knows. There's two knocks coming from the stair way. Neal doesn't glance over. Ignores the ghosts entirely.

"I sense...anger....disappointment....rage..." Charisma says.

"They did die horribly." Neal explained.

"No. It's not about them....these feelings are directed at whomever lives here..."

Neal blinked. Looked at the banister, El and Peter stand there. They're see-through and they're frowning at him; there is a red glow about them as well.

"I suppose they hate me." Neal says. "For bringing you here." he glances at the hippie then back to the stairs. The apparitions are gone but he knows they both are still watching him.

"They want....something...though..." Charisma says.

Neal sighs. "Me out?"

"No." Charisma breaths air in deeply, as if scenting for something. "They want you to stay...but....they want..."

Neal waited as the woman tried to suss out what his ghosts wanted. Even though he knew he could ask them questions via their knocking system. But Peter and El didn't always have the electro-whatever to do that all the time. They had to build it up. It'd also been a day and a half since Keller. The apparition was probably all they could do.

"They won't talk to me." Charisma finally shrugged. "They've blocked me out."

She left with directions for a cleansing if he wanted to help them move on; Neal stood in the foyer of the house like an idiot holding the herbs in one hand and sighing loudly.

In the kitchen, El is throwing a fit. All of the cupboards are banging away. Neal groans and goes upstairs to the master bedroom. He tumbled onto the mattress and yells into the fabric of the well made bed. The banging in the kitchen is still going on as Neal lies there's several minutes later.

He closes his eyes and ignores it until all is quiet. Then he hears disembodied chuckling. "First fights are always the worst." it's Peter. Neal doesn't move to see if there is an apparition. Sometimes there is an apparition and sometimes there isn't.

"Look, it was just too hot last night." Neal said.

"I know, El just...she just feels cold all the time." Peter replied.

"I guess the afterlife is just a cold place." Neal muttered.

"She didn't want you to be cold."

"I'm sorry." Neal turned onto his side, and as he thought, nothing was there. Even though he could feel another presence with him. He could feel cold fingers on his cheek stroking a gentle caress from temple to chin.

"I'm so sorry, baby..." El's voice comes next.

"Did you tire yourself out?" Neal asked. Worried that he'd have to wait for El to charge her batteries, again.

"Maybe a little." She admitted.

Neal nodded; "I'll be okay. El, it's very warm here. I won't freeze tonight."

"Okay, but no promises." El said.

~*~

El kissed Neal's forehead but she isn't certain he felt it. Sometimes he can and sometimes he can't. She feels like she is fading. She feels so far away. Peter catches her before she can fade into the shadows. He kisses her and promises that he'll take care of Neal while she's resting. El sighs and curls into the darkness to rest.

~*~

Peter pushes Neal onto the bed; the boy goes with a small frown but he pulls his shoes and socks off, followed by his jeans and t-shirt. Peter tucks him in. It's not time for bed. There's hours before he'd normally think of it, but Neal isn't ready to actually challenge his ghostly care takers. He goes with ease and Peter climbs under the covers to hold Neal as much as any ghost can.

~*~

Neal doesn't think he can sleep, but he finds himself slowly dropping off.

 


End file.
